


Rain Check

by GrizzlyRenegade



Category: No Fandom
Genre: Introversion, Isolation, Modern Era, Original Character(s), Original Fiction, Short One Shot, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-31
Updated: 2020-01-31
Packaged: 2021-02-25 14:27:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22497595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GrizzlyRenegade/pseuds/GrizzlyRenegade
Summary: A short story look at a struggle of isolation and trying to free yourself from the ease of solitude.





	Rain Check

Silence is something that people can never truly experience. It is unknowable because even the sound of your breathing or heart beating in your ears will still shatter any attempt of finding it. Bertram Thompson had considered this in passing but had instantly dismissed it as his mind dived deeper into the ocean of his imagination, past the layers of obscure facts and minor philosophical epiphanies and into the deeps of themes, prompts and concepts. 

While the thirty five year old’s mind was swimming and looping through imagined rings of patterns and ideas, his body was fidgeting in the plush faux leather desk chair of his home office on a rainy Friday night. His leg thumping up and down made the chair’s springs squeak and the pen in his left hand rattled while being twirled around in his hand like a showgirl’s baton. The cord of his headphones bobbed along with his body but no sound could be heard from them. In fact, the phone they were plugged into had music queued up but was paused about a minute into a piece of early 2000’s punk music. The only music in the room was coming intermittently from Bertam himself who hummed the song’s chorus over and over again in between his bouts of self-commentary.

The desk itself was strewn with notepads, pens and the man’s moleskin journal. His desktop journal sported a technicolor mane of sticky notes themselves covered in scribbles of notes, reminders, and ideas for Bertram to follow up on when the current of his mind slowed enough to allow new cargo. Light from the monitor danced across his glasses, hiding the green of his darting eyes.

This moment was shattered by the chime of his cellphone, fully charged yet plugged anyway. Bertram’s open mouth snapped shut into a frown and he picked up the device and read the text.

“Hey man, I hope you were still planning on coming out tonight! We missed you the last couple weeks at game night.”

His “best” friend Aaron had roped him into coming to weekly game nights a few months ago as an excuse to hang out with their busy schedules. It wasn’t that he didn’t like Aaron. His former college roommate knew him better than any other adult he knew, but Aaron loved to invite new people to these game nights. People Bertram would have to pretend to want to get to know and hear their awkward first meeting jokes and stories that they had rehearsed over who knows how many social events and functions.

He leaned back in his chair and sighed in exasperation. His head swiveled back and forth like an automated sentry, looking for inspiration for a reason not to attend. Unable to find one, he lurched up and wobbled on long asleep legs. 

There was an hour between now and when he would have to leave to get to Aaron’s quaint, suburban townhome. If he wanted to be on time anyway. Bertram had found that arriving on time made it very easy to justify leaving early. People didn’t question someone leaving if they had gotten there before them. It was one of the few social niceties that he had learned to work in his favor to avoid extending social encounters. He carried a speaker to the shower with him and turned on the audio book he had been chipping away at for a week. Showers were a place for ideas to be absorbed and mulled over while he performed the necessary hygienic rituals. It also prevented him from scrutinizing the cleanliness of the shower to much. It was clean. Enough. He just never had the patience to go over it for more than a 20 minute cleaning job.

He was still in the middle of shaving his disobedient stubble when his phone chimed again. Shaking his sudsy razor in the water with one hand and picking up his phone with the other, he paused the narrator's deep soothing soliloquy. Another text from Aaron was displayed on his screen.

“Charlie is excited to meet you!”

A low growl rumbled in his chest. He threw the phone down on the counter, the hard case slapping against the softwood counter. Speeding through the rest of shave only resulted in one knick on his neck. Nothing anybody would really bother to bring up in polite conversation. Bertram proceeded to put on underwear and sit down on the edge of his slightly organized queen bed. The blankets and pillows were on the bed and in semi sensible positions at least.

He stared at his phone for another 5 minutes, wracked his brain for a reason not to get in his car and sit and fume in traffic. Charlie was his friends latest attempt at a set up. Bertram knew he was the only one of Aaron’s closest friends who wasn’t married. Aaron saw that as a challenge to fix. Bertram saw it as an invasion of his privacy. He was perfectly content with his solitude and privacy. His job as a short story author required peace and isolation. Other people always got nosy and tried to offer untrained advice or declared that they just couldn’t understand what he was going for. Such a drag. His editor obviously got it or he wouldn’t have had steady employment for the last four years at a literary magazine.

Charlie was a co-worker of Aaron’s at a boutique marketing firm who worked through the data and analytics of the agency’s various campaigns and initiatives.His friend claimed that his potential mate liked to read and bake and was a self declared foodie who just had to try every new restaurant that opened within a ten block radius. The way Aaron carried on about it made it seem like these small tidbits guaranteed a long and successful relationship and that postponing their meeting signaled insanity on Bertram’s part.

He chuckled at the idea of his friend animatedly proclaiming this to his face but also this was supposed to be about Charlie, while also dragging his feet at the idea of having to live it out. He looked into his kitchen again for salvation but the two day old stack of rinsed dishes that had yet to make it into the still-full dishwasher denied him any reason not to walk out the door. He looked back at his phone and decided he might as well get there early and start running out the clock.

Bertram started down the stairs to his garage while his muscles seized up and his body rebelled against him.

“Why? Why does anyone care what I do? If I want to stay at home and not be around a bunch of sycophants then that’s my right isn’t it?”

This thought managed to bring him to a standstill before another voice, still his own but more firm replied.

“Because Aaron is your friend and he deserves your respect. You don’t have to enjoy it but you owe it to him to be a good friend and show up. You bail on him way too often.”

The firmness of the voice pushed Bertram into motion again and he resumed his descent. His indiganace would not, however, go quietly into that good night.

“Is it also fair of him to force these setups on me? I don’t want to have to be a jerk to his friend because I’m not looking for a relationship right now. In fact, Aaron is an asshole for putting me in this situation.”

He cocked his head and shrugged as if trying to convince himself it was a good point. But fighting his conscience was never that easy.

“He is a good friend for looking out for me and I can’t be mad at him for that. He may not understand my motivations but he has always been there for me when I asked. I need to show him he matters.”

Another chime on his phone interrupted the stirring internal debate. He paused once more to check his phone. This time it wasn’t Aaron texting him. It was an email from his editor at the magazine.

“Great work on your last piece, we all loved it. We want to run a sequel in the next issue. Get me a first draft by the end of next week.”

Bertram smiled in satisfaction at the praise before a realization came to him. He did already have an outline written up for the story his editor was asking for and getting a rough draft done would only take him a day or two. But then Aaron didn’t know that. His thumbs started flying across his keyboard.

“Sorry man, last minute deadline just came up. Have to get a rough draft finished by tomorrow night. Rain check?”

A reply came within a minute. He was already headed back upstairs.

“Charlie and I are bummed but I get it. Dim sum at the usual place Sunday?”

Bertram sat back at his desk in a t-shirt and his underwear and replied.

“I’ll do my best.”


End file.
